Economic burden of pneumococcal infections in children under 5 years of age

Ceyhan, Mehmet; Ozsurekci, Yasemin; Aykac, Kubra; Hacibedel, Basak; Ozbilgili, Egemen

Indirect costs for each disease were calculated using the same method. The average monthly gross earnings (€774.14) obtained from the Labor Cost Survey 2012 conducted by Turkish Statistical Institute (TurkStat) were used as the basis of the calculation. 20 According to the data from TurkStat, labor force participation rate in February 2014 was 70.0% among males and 28.7% among females. 21 The rate of employment was adjusted to 90% in fathers and 41% in mothers. 22 Daily earnings were determined to be €23.23 (€774.14 £ 0.90/30 days) for fathers and €10.58 [(€774.14 £ 0.41)/30 days] for mothers. According to the assumptions based on an expert opinion, mothers were assumed to be the primary caretakers and were therefore considered to accrue work loss over the course of a child's hospital stay. The fathers were assumed to have one day of work loss per week over the course of a child's hospital stay. The parents were also supposed to come for the control visits together and thus, it was assumed one day of work loss at each control visit. Workforce losses of the mothers and fathers were calculated by multiplying aforementioned earnings by the number of days of work loss. Expenses for round trip to hospital were calculated by multiplying the number round trips to hospital by €4.59. 23 It was assumed that the fathers had a round trip to hospital every day over the course of his child's hospital stay and that 5 more round trips to hospital arose from mothers making 1 trip to the hospital on the first day of hospitalization and 1 trip from the hospital on the day of discharge and from both mothers and fathers making 4 round trips to the hospital for two control visits after discharge. All costs were expressed in Euros according to the 2014 currency of Turkish Liras (€1.00 D 2.9 Turkish Liras, without inflation adjustment). The probabilistic sensitivity analysis was performed to assess the robustness of the indirect cost estimates, including costs for total round trips and workforce losses of the mothers and fathers, for each disease and the sensitivity analysis range value was §25% of the base value.